Sad thing is there's no reason to lie at all. Electric cars really are terrible for daily use in anything other than a condensed metropolitan area. Try having an electric car as your only vehicle in a rural area (which is the majority of the US).

Electric cars really are terrible for daily use in anything other than a condensed metropolitan area.

Where most people live?

Makes more sense than having a tractor or even a large truck in a city. A lot of people will drive less than the range of this car for their daily commute. Imagine this - get up in the morning, hop in your electric car, drive to work. Park in works parking lot and plug it in. At the end of the day drive home.

How is that terrible for everyday use? Other than plugging it in it is no different from a normal car. Better in fact since you don't have to try and find a gas station one day a week. Seems good to me.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Majin SSJ Eric

Try having an electric car as your only vehicle in a rural area (which is the majority of the US).

But not the majority of the population.

Give it time, I'm sure when the first gas cars were starting up gas stations were few and far between. The point is that it is a step in the right direction.

Edit:

Quote:

[The United States] is a very urbanized population, with 82% residing in cities and suburbs as of 2008 (the worldwide urban rate is 50.5%)

Electric cars have already been proven with current power generation methods to be as or more environmentally destructive in their entire life cycle. The reason is simple...we still use coal, gas, and other methods of electric generation that produce the same or similar by products as gas powered cars.

Not really.

Power plants have much greater efficiency at turning fuel into power, and even after transmission and storage losses, an electric vehicle creates much less pollution than an ICE powered one, if we are talking about the energy the vehicle uses for operation.

However, it's more costly and more polluting to make that electric vehicle in the first place, and safely disposing of batteries is a big hassle.

Sad thing is there's no reason to lie at all. Electric cars really are terrible for daily use in anything other than a condensed metropolitan area. Try having an electric car as your only vehicle in a rural area (which is the majority of the US).

The 2009 Prius MSRP is $22,000 and the battery price you offered is $2,589.

Which is 11.7% of the total cost or even less than the Model S. Even farther than your number provided.

That is for a hybrid and not a full electric car. Geez man..

Ford is currently promoting its $39,200 Focus EV at events around the country. It has a 23 kilowatt-hour battery pack.

"When you move into an all-electric vehicle, the battery size moves up to around 23 kilowatt hours, [and] it weighs around 600 to 700 pounds," Mr. Mulally said at Fortune magazine's Brainstorm Green conference in California.

"They're around $12,000 to $15,000 [a battery]" for a type of car that normally sells for about $22,000, he continued, referring to the price of a gasoline-powered Focus. "So, you can see why the economics are what they are."

Power plants have much greater efficiency at turning fuel into power, and even after transmission and storage losses, an electric vehicle creates much less pollution than an ICE powered one, if we are talking about the energy the vehicle uses for operation.

However, it's more costly and more polluting to make that electric vehicle in the first place, and safely disposing of batteries is a big hassle.

Exactly. Electric cars are more efficient and produce less pollution from their power source (even if it's coal power) than fuel cars do. Like you pointed out though, one of their big problems is the safe and environmentally conscious disposal of batteries. In addition to that, there's the question of where many of the rare earth metals required for the batteries come from and how it's mined. Oftentimes the metals are mined using environmentally disastrous methods in countries like China.

Electric cars definitely are interesting in some respects, but they're not the panacea that some make them out to be. I wish they were, but it looks like we won't have something like that until we have viable hydrogen fuel cells, algae farms for biofuel, or batteries that can be made and disposed of is an environmentally safe fashion.

But back on topic, the info from the CNN test drive and the computer data pretty much puts the final nail in the coffin for the NYT review. I wonder how long until Tesla files a libel suit.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Stealth Pyros

The Model S is gorgeous in person, I saw a red one up close in a parking lot not long ago.

That it is. I saw one in my local Home Depot parking lot. The screen in the middle console looks goofy, but the car is stunning. It reminds me of an Aston Martin.